No Question Of Showing Leniency: Chhattisgarh HC Upholds 20 Years’ Sentence Of Accused In POCSO Case
The Chhattisgarh High Court upheld the conviction and sentence of 20 years imposed upon an accused allegedly committing sexual assault on a minor girl.
The Court was deciding a criminal appeal filed by the 20-year-old man against the judgment of conviction passed by the Additional Sessions Judge.
A Division Bench of Chief Justice Ramesh Sinha and Justice Ravindra Kumar Agrawal relied upon the judgment of the Supreme Court in the case of State of U.P. v. Sonu Kushwaha (2023) in which it was held as under –
“The POCSO Act was enacted to provide more stringent punishments for the offences of child abuse of various kinds and that is why minimum punishments have been prescribed in Sections 4, 6, 8 and 10 of the POCSO Act for various categories of sexual assaults on children. Hence, Section 6, on its plain language, leaves no discretion to the Court and there is no option but to impose the minimum sentence as done by the Trial Court. When a penal provision uses the phraseology “shall not be less than….”, the Courts cannot do offence to the Section and impose a lesser sentence. The Courts are powerless to do that unless there is a specific statutory provision enabling the Court to impose a lesser sentence. However, we find no such provision in the POCSO Act. Therefore, notwithstanding the fact that the respondent may have moved ahead in life after undergoing the sentence as modified by the High Court, there is no question of showing any leniency to him.”
Advocate J.K. Gupta appeared on behalf of the appellant/accused while Panel Lawyer Sakib Ahmad appeared on behalf of the respondent/State.
Facts of the Case -
As per the prosecution story, the father of the victim made a written complaint that the victim aged 16 years was mentally weak. One day when he came home after work, his wife told him that the appellant/accused took the victim to his house and raped her. On asking about the incident, it was informed that the victim went away with the accused and he took her inside his house. He locked the door and raped her forcefully.
The victim opened the door and came home back. She told her mother about the incident and then the complaint was filed. Thereafter, an FIR was filed for the offence under Section 376 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Section 6 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 (POCSO Act). Based on the evidence, the Trial Court convicted the appellant and sentenced him to 20 years of rigorous imprisonment along with a fine of Rs. 5,000/-. Being aggrieved, he was before the High Court.
The High Court in view of the facts and circumstances of the case noted, “The prosecutrix (PW-1), in para 3 of her statement has stated that before two-three months from today, she was sitting at her maternal aunt’s house, at the same time, the accused was standing in front of his house and called her with a gesture, then she went to him. After that the accused took her inside his house and asked her to sit, then she told the accused that she will go to home. After that, the accused closed the door of his house and gave her Rs.20/- and told that he will marry her. After this, the accused asked her to lie down and took off her clothes and underwear and raped her and the accused put his penis in her mouth.”
The Court said that the Special Judge rightly convicted the appellant for the offence under Section 6 of the POCSO Act and there is no illegality and irregularity in the findings recorded by the Trial Court.
The Court, therefore, concluded that the prosecution succeeded in proving its case against the appellant.
Accordingly, the High Court dismissed the appeal and upheld the judgment of the Trial Court.
Cause Title- Ashish Sendariya @ Bhundu v. State of Chhattisgarh (Neutral Citation: 2024:CGHC:25400-DB)
